Jordan Grant: MacGyver with a heart

His T-Shirt says, “I void warranties.” He rebuilds computers and donates them to needy families. An Eagle Scout who joined the National Guard in high school, he spent a year serving in Baghdad. He once hotwired his cellphone into a moden for his computer in the middle of the Mojave Desert to win a $100 bet. He’s a dishonest used car dealer’s worest enemy. He’s featured in Popular Mechanics. And he’s about to become a father. He’s the most interesting man in the world–or at the very least, my nephew of the week.

Check it out, from the Columbia Tribune:

A Columbia man whose hobby is rebuilding computers and giving them away to people who could not otherwise afford them is being featured in the August issue of Popular Mechanics magazine as a “Hometown Hero.”

Jordan Grant is an Army veteran who did a one-year tour in Iraq and who now is employed at Carfax. He has been donating refurbished computers through Freecycle.org.

Starting in 2009, Grant — who graduated from Hickman High School and the University of Missouri — began to pick up parts from the website and build computers at his home as a hobby. Then, he began to offer up his computers on Freecycle.org, and he said so far there have been about two dozen takers.